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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25531213">Sucker's Prayer</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/theinimitablefolding/pseuds/theinimitablefolding'>theinimitablefolding</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Persona 5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Fluff, M/M, NSFW, Some angst, it's gay lads, some mentions of blood and violence (past)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 08:26:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,133</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25531213</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/theinimitablefolding/pseuds/theinimitablefolding</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After the final battle, Akira can no longer bury his feelings for Ryuji, and before his old wounds are even healed, he finds himself charging into a new, and different battle, not to steal a heart, but to finally confess his feelings.  However, Akira quickly discovers that once his confession is made, the real hard part begins: leading a normal life with the man he loves.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Amamiya Ren/Sakamoto Ryuji, Kurusu Akira/Sakamoto Ryuji, Persona 5 Protagonist/Sakamoto Ryuji</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Sucker's Prayer</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hey y'all. This will be a little more low effort. It's just going to be a short series of moments in the developing relationship of these cute boys.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Kurusu Akira had awoken that morning feeling as though his triumph from the day before – no less than securing his and his friends’ freedom, to say nothing of saving the entire world! – had hardly been any victory at all. It was the marvelous success overhead which covered up the disaster underneath. There was acid in his throat as he tried to breath, and as he sat up in bed, the sheets falling delicately around his waist and revealing his battered form, he could not help but be astounded at how much he had changed. One year ago, he was thin, waifish almost, in that particularly fashionable way. Now though, he had scars over layers of muscle, and he moved with a practiced grace and coolness which he had always admired in others, but never thought himself capable of. </p>
<p>	Akira gingerly placed his feet on the ground, his head swimming, his whole body hurting. He removed a bucket from beneath his bed, kept there for just such an occasion, and spat a bloody phlegm into it, careful not to make too much noise as he felt the bleed in his nose come loose and get deposited in his mouth, before being redeposited in the bucket. He did this several times, disgusted by it as he always was. He pulled a tissue out from beneath his bed and held it to his nose, careful not to tilt his head back; that had been his mistake the first time something in a palace had gotten him square in the nose, and it had led to a particularly aching stomach, and a terribly sore throat for the next three days – not an experience he wished to repeat.</p>
<p>	On that occasion he had complained to Makoto, and he remembered exactly what she had said, and he heard it clearly now: you can swallow about a pint of blood before you get ill, so maybe next time try just leaning your head forward into a tissue or a bucket. Thus, both of those accommodations now. </p>
<p>	He shook his head to drive the foggy memory away – that particular fog which arose each time he returned from a palace, and which he felt led to some of the worst sleep he had ever gotten. It was like sleeping on too-much allergy medication, where the slumber would be long, but inevitably unrestful, leaving him to wake up feeling somehow more awful than when he had gone to sleep. At least his muscles hurt less, at least his jaw wasn’t as tight, at least his head pounded less. This was just the brief afterglow of his work, and he would bear it. Or, he reflected, he might not have to any longer. It might not be necessary – it was all over, or so it would appear. A strange sense of relief slowly submerged him.</p>
<p>	Over. He thought. It was a strange thing, to be finished with that part of his life – with Persona, with Mementos, with palaces, with double lives and thievery and skirting the law. One year ago, he wouldn’t have believed it, but he was going to miss it. What he would not miss, however, was the feeling that every single one of his teeth was one good jerk away from popping out of his mouth. There was something about getting hit there which rattled the bones supremely, which made him feel like his body was about to be separated from his being – like he would suddenly find himself hit so hard that his soul got knocked right out the back of his head. He spat once more into the bucket and stood up.</p>
<p>	No Morgana, he thought with a feeling of terrible sadness. Loathe as he was to admit it, he would miss the cat most of all. Even as he stood perched on the shelf by the stairs, telling Akira to stay home for the evening, even as annoyed as that had made him, it was going to be hard to readjust to life without him. He sighed the small, sad sigh of a life which he had fought hard to not have to live, and yet, a life that he would miss terribly. Maybe he would do something with the skills – there was always real thievery of real money. A Robin Hood type thing. He smiled at that. Ryuji would absolutely be pleased to join in, the others were a bit more up in the air. </p>
<p>	As if on cue, Ryuji appeared at the base of the staircase, his nose bandaged, eyes puffy and tired, posture terrible. There he was, looking roughly the same as he had a year ago, and yet somehow still so tremendously different than he had ever looked before that moment: his shoulders were broader, his gaze more knowing, his smile still as mischievous, but somehow more pessimistic. They had both – Akira realized as he was looking at his best friend – grown. They weren’t quite adults just yet, but they weren’t children either. They weren’t the children that they had been, at any rate. </p>
<p>	“Oh shit, hi man, sorry I had…you weren’t answering your phone.” Ryuji said, half averting his gaze from the almost entirely naked Akira, who was only wearing a sweatpants at that moments, the waistband tantalizingly low on his hips. “I’ll…uh…” </p>
<p>	“Come up, I’ll change.” Akira said. Ryuji, half-dumbly nodded, ascending the staircase and then sitting on the couch in the corner of the room, his gaze still averted. This had been a routine of theirs ever since the first palace – Ryuji would check up on Akira before anyone else did. It had become an unspoken ritual, so much so that tomorrow when Anne and Makoto stopped by, they would inevitably ask if Ryuji had come already, which he inevitably had. They were all friends, best friends even, but there was something that Ryuji and Akira had that none of them did. Maybe it was the bond of discovery, they had been the first ones to figure it all out, after all. </p>
<p>	“How’re you feeling?” Akira asked. It was an apt question, during the last battle things had gotten particularly sticky for all of them, Ryuji included, who had taken one of the worst hits any of them had ever seen. Battle lines rarely broke down amongst the Phantom Thieves, but Anne and Haru both had gone back to check on him. Ryuji, much to his credit, flexed his biceps and smiled.</p>
<p>	“These muscles are basically armor all on their own!” He bragged, but Akira could see the large bruise running from his throat down to at least his armpit, and his split lip. It was shocking that he hadn’t lost a tooth, or split a blood vessel in his eye. Hell, he was half-expecting Ryuji to be unconscious when they collected him, but he had been all piss and vinegar when he stood up. “How are you feeling, oh fearless leader?” </p>
<p>	“Like I’ve been hit by a truck, honestly.” He said. Ryuji sat forward, his chin on his fist. Akira looks at him, noting that rarest of looks in his eyes: searching, thoughtfulness. Ryuji was not a dumb person, but he wasn’t thoughtful by any stretch of the imagination. This ran counter to someone like Yosuke, who absolutely was dumb, but was still very thoughtful – and incredibly talented too. “Uh oh, last time I saw that look you recommended that we go buy guns together.” </p>
<p>	“Was I wrong? And besides, ain’t that a bad example considering you agreed to it?” Ryuji said.</p>
<p>	“After you revealed that they were model guns.” Akira said with a chuckle. He had dipped back behind a box, pulling his pants on and buttoning up a white, button-down oxford which had been a gift from Futaba – an excellent gift, it must be said. It had become his favorite shirt, and not only for who gave it to him. </p>
<p>	“I was still right.” Ryuji said. “But anyway, listen, I was thinking that we should do something soon, maybe not today, if you’re still spitting blood.” Akira nodded and put on his glasses, at this point a worthless affectation, but one that he was nonetheless partial to. Maybe he would see an optometrist, just to get a pair of real glasses – surely he was in need of at least some sort of corrective lenses, even if only to correct some of the skewed machinery of his eyes which had surely been knocked loose during some battle or another. </p>
<p>	“Just us?” Akira asked. Ryuji shrugged. </p>
<p>	They would surely do something with everyone. Surely they would all go hang out, hang out a lot even. There would be half-parties, long nights, the joy of nearly a dozen friends basking in the glow of a job done – hell, well done! But just the two of them? A private celebration. Akira felt that old and long dormant kicking of feeling in his gut. That painful rearing of the head of his heart. He looked at Ryuji and noted the strength of his jawline, those honest eyes, but most of all that mouth. The lips in a grin. He felt the swelling in his heart, as though it were becoming too full. He had snuffed this feeling in the lead up to the end, but now it reappeared. Just the two of them.</p>
<p>	“I’d like that.” Akira said. That image, which so often cradled him to sleep, made a noise in his head. Ryuji in his lap, the tangling of his hands in his hair, the feeling of teeth on his neck. I love you, I love you, I love you. They whispered it in this fantasy, but he felt the need to shout it in reality. As though just doing that could shatter Ryuji’s painfully straight façade. Even if he was straight, that was one thing he could stand to do: be a little less painfully so. </p>
<p>	This was the way this worked for Akira, and the way he suspected it worked only for him: his emotions were something which he could, and often did, bury. It made sense to do so, he had a crush on Ryuji, that much was clear, but it was also the case that he had to work alongside him to do nothing less than save the world, and as such any confessions, if they were to come at all, would have to wait. So he snuffed the crush at almost all times, save for right before bed, when he would slip his hand into his pants and touch himself. Thinking about Ryuji’s mouth. Fixated, almost.</p>
<p>	He looked at him again, painfully aware now that there was nothing to stop him from telling Ryuji how he felt. Would he? He’d thought about it, of course, but it never made sense to give it serious thought, he figured this would last longer somehow. But now he was free to ruin the friendship. What would he say? Hey bro, I know you always talk about Anne, but have you considered – oh I don’t know – fucking me, because I actually happen to be totally crazy about you for some elusive reason?</p>
<p>	That wasn’t fair, and he knew it. His reasons for wanting Ryuji were clear, and he had annumerated them more than once: a fierce but smart loyalty, a drive to do what was right, that endless affection for his friends, and a seemingly limitless store of perseverance. And, of course, his astounding handsomeness. Akira could, and would, admit that he had first been drawn to Ryuji because of his beauty, but he had stuck around for the other things. </p>
<p>	Those were, naturally, the reasons he would take Ryuji out. Would date him. Would marry him. After all, weren’t they best friends for a reason? But there were other factors to his crush. The curve of Ryuji’s collar bone, the tone of his shoulders, his abs, his quads, and what sort of man would he be if he could not admit to looking more than once at Ryuji’s butt in running shorts. Yes, he was a man who Akira would gladly date, but he couldn’t understate how badly he wanted to fuck him. Make love? At some point, but his fantasies were most presently animalistic in nature. Rather than follow this line of thought more than he had, Akira sat down next to his friend on the chair, to make it easier to speak to one another, and easier to hide his half-erection. </p>
<p>	“What should we do?” Ryuji asked, and Akira couldn’t help but shrug. </p>
<p>	“What do we never do?” Akira responded. “What do we never do that we couldn’t do because…you know. What’s something you want to do?” Almost immediately, Ryuji’s eyes gleamed and he smiled like a cat with a plan.</p>
<p>	“I’ve got an idea!”</p>
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